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With
that being said, let’s dive in...

Okay,
so this review, is, like, a month
later than I originally anticipated it to be. “Loughborough Comic Con” took
place on Sunday the 22nd of October at Loughborough Leisure Centre.
Ordinarily, I like to have a con review up within 2-3 days, so this one is
waaaaaaay overdue. Alas, since finishing my Master’s degree in July, I’ve
started a new career and new job in October, which has been a huge adjustment
for me and has taken a lot of time to adapt, hence the delay. No matter, gentle
readers, your friendly, neighbourhood Shangel is back with not one, not two,
but THREE convention reviews over the next week and a half! I shall be starting
with this one, Loughborough. Then moving onto this past weekend’s “Reading
Comic Con”, and finally finishing out my convention year with my favourite con
on the UK scene, “Wales Comic Con”, next week. Loughborough was a unique event
in that I was predominantly travelling the two-hours north-east in order to see
my friends from the “Game of Thrones” world: Aimee Richardson, Kerry Ingram,
and Ross Mullan. Sure, I’d see other people while I was there, but my main
motivations to attend were to visit friends. From a reviewing perspective, this
highlights a problem in that I will not discuss what is said between myself and
a friend at a convention. There is a difference between meeting a celebrity at
an autograph table and chatting to a friend about personal shit at an autograph
table. One I’ll talk about, one I won’t. Thus, my two-and-a-half-hour
conversation with Aimee and Kerry will not be shared within this review outside
of a handful of acceptable snippets, which will result in a much
shorter-than-usual discussion of the event. Everybody ready? Let’s dive in...

Myself
and my friend Hayley left Gloucester at 8am, ready to arrive in Loughborough
around the time doors were opening at 10am. If there’s one thing I’ve learned
during my weary decade of attending Comic-Cons, it’s that you don’t want to
start outside in late October if you can help it. With an event the size of
this one, it’s perfectly fine to roll up 10 minutes after opening and walk
straight in. Keeps you warm, keeps you happy, and you don’t really miss
anything. Of course, that would not be my advice for an event like London Film
& Comic Con or MCM London, as by the time you casually strolled into the
event, the virtual queuing numbers would suck
for any headline guest and you’d likely miss out on getting their autograph.

The
cool thing about “Loughborough Comic Con” was that the organiser, Paul Waidley,
offered me free entry into the event, which was very cool of him and very much
appreciated! Overall, my impressions of “Loughborough Comic Con” – which I
believe was a first-time event here – were positive. As I’ve mentioned before,
a strange phenomena has transpired over the past year or so in that I’ve found
myself being drawn closer and closer to the indie cons and further and further
away from the drama and cattle-market mentality of the larger ones. For
instance, between the cattle-market atmosphere and the astronomically atrocious
prices, the chances of me ever going to “Walker Stalker London” or “Heroes
& Villains Fan Fest London” are slim-to-none. Unless a truly unmissable
guest is added to the line-up, I’ll never go because I don’t want to support a
company that charges mind-boggling prices for a 5-second phone selfie or over
£100 for some studio photos. It’s unjustifiable to me. If that’s your thing,
fair play to you and enjoy yourself! But please be aware that paying those
prices makes everyone else’s prices rise too, which makes everything go up and
up, and up, so you’re shooting yourself in the foot really if you agree to
prices that are too high and unfair. Sometimes it’s better to let your lack of
dropping money down do the talking for you, which it will if the higher prices
don’t sell. Just my two cents, do with that what you will.

Back
to Loughborough...

Loughborough
Comic Con took place at Loughborough Leisure Centre, which is pretty standard
for localised indie cons, so the results are always hit or miss depending on
the size, layout, lighting and quality of the leisure centre itself. I’ve seen
some stinkers and I’ve seen some amazing cons take place in leisure centres
over the years. Thankfully, Loughborough falls largely into the latter. The
comic artists were mostly in a corridor just before entering the main hall, the
main hall contained the guests, the merchandise stalls, and other attractions,
the studio photo area was a room just off of the main hall, and the Q&A
panel room was upstairs on the first floor. Everything was well spaced-out and
there were very few issues with congestion or disjointedness, even though there
were quite a lot of attendees. The size of the venue also felt pretty perfect
for the attractions and attendee numbers too. All great to see from a
first-time event as often it takes two or three attempts to get the basics right
as problems are rarely known until after a show has finished. Kudos to all
involved! The only downside was that the main hall had this weird yellow
lighting, which was very jarring on the eyes after a while. People susceptible
to migraines would have likely been screwed if their migraines were triggered
by unusual lighting. It’s not the end of the world, it’s just a little bit
distracting – and makes getting a decent table selfie that little bit harder as
everyone looks over-exposed. There’s very little that Paul or the other crew
could do about it though, as that is the leisure centre’s lighting. It is what
it is. At least it isn’t too dark,
like my least favourite convention venue in the world, the Motorpoint Arena in
Cardiff. You need a torch and emergency footsteps just to find the guests in
that shit-hole! It’s not a shit-hole really, it just has atrocious lighting.
Everything else is good.

It
was clear from the offset that Paul was going all-out on giving attendees a
good bargain for the price of their entry ticket, as the attractions were
plentiful and in some cases unique. There was a Cyberman display from “Doctor
Who”, showing the various upgrades and incarnations that have been in the
franchise from 1963 to the present day. There was a Jurassic Park photo
opportunity whereby you could sit on the toilet (I doubt you were allowed to
pull your underwear and trousers down) and recreate the iconic scene from the
movie. There was a massive, realistic looking Groot wandering around for the
day. There was an Iron Throne replica from “Game Of Thrones”...there was a lot
of cool shit to do, even if some of it cost a little more, e.g. having a
professional photo of you taken on the Iron Throne. I do appreciate and enjoy
it when Comic Con organisers go the extra mile like that.

Overall,
Loughborough Comic Con was decent value for money. The photographer taking the studio
photo pictures was tremendous and the backdrop used for those photos was decent
(not always the case, I assure you). The line-up of guests for an indie event
was strong, albeit a lot of the line-up were regular Comic Con frequenters, so
if you’d been to many events before, the chances would be strong that you’d
already have met most of the line-up before. But for locals and newbies, and
diehard fans that wanted to meet these people again, the line-up was great. The
likes of Danny John-Jules, Norman Lovett, Andrew Lee Potts, Hannah Spearritt,
Ross Mullan, Aimee Richardson, Kerry Ingram, Paul Warren and Sophie Aldred were
all in attendance. Furthermore, the crew at the event were tremendous and
conducted themselves professionally. They were an asset to the event and to
themselves. Everything on the schedule seemed to start pretty much on time as
well, so the event was well organised not just in the layout and entry times,
but also with professional photos and Q&As as well.

Furthermore,
another really rare and wonderful thing that Paul did was to gather up some of
the guests and the Superheroes Cosplay Group and take them to the Rainbows
Hospice for Children and Young People in Loughborough. It was a chance to meet
the staff, entertain the children and get to know them. To take them away from
their struggles for a while. During the event itself, there were some Rainbows
collection buckets scattered throughout the venue so that money could be raised
for an amazing cause.

I
also attended the Primeval Q&A. Ordinarily, at most cons, I do everything
from memory, panels included. Alas, I did just that on this occasion, but due
to a month elapsing between the event and writing this review, I’ve forgotten
most of it. Rather than trying to half-ass my way through it, I’ll just give
you my overall impressions. Firstly, Ben Mansfield, Hannah Spearritt and Andrew
Lee Potts all came across very well. Ben was the ‘straight guy’ (in comedic
terms), Hannah was the anecdotalist and Andrew Lee Potts was the comedian. I’ve
been to many, many conventions with Hannah and Andrew before, but I’ve never
attended one of their talks, nor have I seen Primeval (I was dragged into the
panel by Hayley!). Even though I had little idea of what they were talking
about when it came to the Primeval specific stories, I still had a great time.
Andrew Lee Potts talking about giving his step-daughter an action figure of his
and how it now resides at the bottom of a toy chest, chewed, broken and unused
was a particular highlight. Great panel!

Outside
of that, I spent a lot of time chatting to Ross, Aimee and Kerry when their
autograph queues were empty (don’t stand and chat when someone behind you is
waiting, don’t be that douche). I caught up with Kerry on the filming she’s
currently doing (or was then, she’s finished now) for “Free Rein” season two,
which was interesting as she was being put up in the Wynnstay Arms in Wrexham
for season one. I know that hotel very well as it’s usually where I stay when I
attend “Wales Comic Con”. It’s a legitimate shit-hole and I’ve found blood
stains underneath the sheets on more than one occasion, but there’s something
so loveable about the place...I think. We also talked about personal stuff,
which I shall not divulge. Same goes for pretty much everything I spoke to
Aimee about. It’s always amazing to see Kerry and Aimee, and I consider them
both to be friends. I met them both, together, at their first-ever convention, “Wales Comic Con 2014 Part I”, which was my first “Wales Comic Con” too, so not only
does that event hold a special place in my heart (particularly as I help book
the guests for “Wales Comic Con” now), but those two do too. I stayed in touch
with both after that event and have seen them grow from 14/15 years old into successful,
confident, empowered young women, which is spectacular to see. When I first saw
them at the event, they both ran around to the other side of the autograph
table to give me a hug and they both happily chatted to me for a very, very
long time. I hadn’t seen either of them in nearly a year, so it was a great
little reunion for #TeamShkaimee.

Finally,
bizarrely, at about 3:30pm, a local school orchestra started performing in the
main hall! I’ve never seen that before! It was certainly unique and they did an
amazing job. It was a good choice of time to do it at 3:30pm too, as if it was
earlier in the day, it would have affected experiences at the autograph tables,
as having a conversation was pretty much out of the question once the orchestra
started.

To
conclude, my time at “Loughborough Comic Con” was very good. There was very
little to complain about in all honesty. A couple of rarer guests perhaps and
slightly less yellow lighting (which is out of Paul’s hands, so there’s nothing
that can be done about that), but other than that, the event was very, very
cool. Guest line-up dependent, I could definitely see myself re-attending again
next year. Particularly if there is someone on the guest list from “Game Of Thrones”
that I haven’t met before. Doesn’t even need to be a big name! I’ve got a list
of 160 people from the show to meet and I’ve now met about 100, which is
jarring if I stopped to think about the cost involved!

Catch
you again in a matter of days for my review of “Reading Comic Con”! Same
organiser, different city.